Overview

History: 2009-Present

Mark Bridgeman appeared as Commander Drax on the Citizens of the Imperium forums in 2003. His presence spoke to the success of QLI's T20 game (2002). Bridgeman had played previous versions of Traveller, and had some fondness for both MegaTraveller (1987) and T4 (1997), but by 2003 he was growing interested in the new d20-based game as well. In fact, some of his earliest fan contributions were conversions of important ships from T4's Milieu 0 to the T20 system.

Fast forward a few years and Jason Kemp founded the first Traveller fanzine of the 21st century, Stellar Reaches (2005-2018), focused on the Gateway Era and the Classic Traveller (1977) and T20 game systems. Many forums contributors supported Kemp's magazine, among them Bridgeman, whose "Lorimar Slot" campaign began with "Hebrin Nights" in Stellar Reaches #4 (Spring 2006).

By 2007, Bridgeman was expanding his fandom, creating an attractive website at the-children-of-earth.org that contained rules variants, ships, and other articles for a variety of Traveller game systems. He was also thinking about starting a more traditional fanzine of his own. When he first broached the idea, he conceived of something complementary to Stellar Reaches, focused on MegaTraveller (1987). Eventually he decided against that first plan, only because another forum member was pursuing the same idea. In February 2009, Bridgeman made another announcement, this time simply that he was creating a "fair use" fanzine. This meant that it would be released under the Far Future Enterprises Fair Use Policy, which was growing more important since Mongoose had become the core Traveller licensee in late 2007. Under Mongoose's new policies, access to the Official Traveller Universe (OTU) was severely restricted for the first time ever. The only way around that was to use FFE's non-commercial license, and to not provide support for Mongoose's Traveller.

Bridgeman's 'zine was to follow the model of DGP's MegaTraveller Journal (1991-1993), meaning it would be big and bulky, with background articles and adventures complementing each other. However, it wouldn't be restricted to MegaTraveller, but instead cover all of the 2d6-focused Traveller games other than Mongoose.

The first issue was focused on T4, because Bridgeman "loved" the system and had had troubles raising submissions from other players. Meanwhile, he also had articles he'd written for his web site, covering improved vehicle design and task systems for T4. So he pulled those in, added some new articles, and collated a single article and some artwork from others, and voila, a new fanzine was born. (One of Bridgeman's new articles was an intriguing look at "The 4 Corners", which broke the usual sector focus of articles by looking at the intersection of four different sectors: Core, Dagudashaag, Massilia, and Zarushagar.)

In September 2009, Bridgeman began beating the bushes for content for a second issue. He repeated the call in January 2010, saying he'd only received three articles. He was obviously unwilling to write another entire 'zine himself.

Another issue of Frontier Report never appeared. Bridgeman's last contribution to Traveller was instead the third part of his "Lorimar Slot" campaign,"The Golden Eclipse", which appeared in Stellar Reaches #10 (Autumn 2010). (He'd said cooperation was a core aspect of Traveller fandom and that he planned to continue contributing to Stellar Reaches even after starting Frontier Report; "The Golden Eclipse" proved that true.) Bridgeman disappeared entirely from Citizens of the Imperium, and thus Traveller fandom, around the same time. Frontier Report thus remains a one-hit wonder: 99 pages of Traveller goodness.

About the Contents

Obtaining the Magazines

This index is © Copyright 2023 by Shannon Appelcline. It is released under a cc-by-4.0 license, allowing reuse with attribution.

Main Index

📚 Background: Misc

🌌 Background: Geographic, Imperium, Domain of Ilelish¹

1. The Domain of Ilelish lies between the Solomani Sphere and Aslan Space and was the home of the Suerrat Republic. It includes the Daibei Sector, the Ilelish Sectyor, Reaver's Deep, and the Zarushagar Sector, and also administers the Verge Sector.

🌌 Background: Geographic, Imperium, Domain of Sylea¹

1. The Domain of Sylea is the heart of the Third Imperium. It includes Core Sector, Delpha Sector, Fornast Sector, Massilia Sector.

🌌 Background: Geographic, Imperium, Domain of Vland¹

1. The Domain of Vland dates back to the Ziru Sirka and is the home of the Vlani. It includes Corridor Sector, Dagudashaag Sector, Gushemege Sector, and Vland Sector, and also administers Reft Sector.

🛠️ Equipment: Misc

🚀 Equipment: Transport

⬆️ Meta

🗣️ NPCs

📜 Rules